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FOIA Number: 2006-0462-F
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Clinton Presidential Records
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Speechwriting
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Terry Edmonds
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7-2-96 Church Burnings White House
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Draft 7/1/96 8:00pm
PRESIDENT WILLIAM J. CLINTON
REMARKS ON CHURCH BURNINGS
ROSE GARDEN
THE WHITE HOUSE
July 2, 1996
Good morning. Over the past month, our nation has come together in outrage, united
by our determined to stop the burning of black churches and other houses of worship across
America. These fires are continuing; just this week, a predominantly African-American
church in Maysville, South Carolina, and a church in Bonner Springs, Kansas, were burned.
These burnings are an affront to our most basic beliefs of religious liberty and racial
tolerance. They pose a challenge to our entire nation:
I am gratified that law enforcement, government, business and the private sector are
coming together to meet this challenge. I have just finished meeting with the Attorneys
General from 12 states that have been afflicted by church burnings. I am pleased to be
joined by these law enforcement leaders, along with the President of the National Association
of Attorneys General, Scott Harshbarger of Massachusetts.
We will continue to work together to track down anyone who may be responsible. I
am pleased that Congress acted with dispatch to pass legislation making it easier to prosecute
and punish anyone who burns a house of worship, and I will sign it next week. And I am also
gratified that there is in an outpouring of private support to help those communities that have
been torn by these acts of arson to rebuild.
We must do more to prevent these crimes. Last month, I asked Federal Emergency
Management Administrator James Lee Witt to take the lead in working with law enforcement
to find ways to stop these burnings before they happen. He has asked law enforcement and
community leaders what more needs to be done, and today we are taking steps in response to
their needs.
today, I am taking emergency action to prevent church burnings, by transferring
$6 million to communities in 12 targeted states. This emergency transfer will let every
county in the South hire a new police officer for the summer patrolling the back roads,
visiting the dozen African-American churches in a typical county, keeping watch for signs of
trouble. These new officers will be a wall of protection to ward off anyone who would
strike out in hate at a house of worship.
andother houses
If they believe it necessary, communities can spend the money for other purposes --
installing floodlights, hiring private security guards -- whatever works to forestall the fires. I
am asking the Congress to quickly approve this transfer, through a special procedure that
allows action without a time-consuming floor vote. We have no time to waste.
Make no mistake: If this emergency measure is not enough to stop the church
burnings, we will do more. We will do whatever it takes, for however long it takes, until
every family can worship in freedom without fear of arson or terror.
Law enforcement alone, no matter how diligent, will never be enough protect
America's churches, mosques and synagogues. We must come together, as one America, to
reject hatred and reach out across lines that divide us. Earlier today, I signed a proclamation
designating this month a National Month of Unity. I call on religious leaders of all faiths to
speak from the pulpit and emphasize the need for healing
and I call on all citizens to
join together during this month, to reach out and strengthen the ideals of democracy and
unity that illuminate our nation and keep us strong.
On Thursday, we will celebrate Independence Day. This year, let us take this
opportunity to rededicate ourselves once again the proposition that all Americans are created
equal.
to our founding principles of
equality religious freedom and
Pag.
1ST STORY of Level 1 printed in FULL format.
Copyright 1996 Little Rock Newspapers, Inc.
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
June 11, 1996, Tuesday
SECTION: NEWS; Pg. 1A
LENGTH: 806 words
HEADLINE: 'PAINFUL MEMORIES' OF TORCHED CHURCHES YIELD DEBATABLE LIST
BYLINE: JULIAN E. BARNES, Demöcrat-Gazette Staff Writer
BODY:
A day after President Clinton was challenged about his recollections of
arsons at black churches in Arkansas in the 1950s and 1960s, the White House
released a list of three churches that burned.
Officials of all three chuches confirmed Monday that their buildings burned,
but none said the fires were arsons.
When Clinton was a 17-year-old high school senior, however, the Roanoke
Baptist Church in his hometown of Hot Springs burned -- possibly in a racially
motivated arson.
In his weekly radio address Saturday, Clinton condemned recent church arsons
in the South and recalled that black churches were burned in the 1950's and
1960's to scare civil rights workers.
"I have vivid and painful memories of black churches being burned in my own
state when I was a child, he said.
The 1963 Roanoke Baptist Church fire was not on the White House list. At the
time, investigators said there was no evidence of arson, but the the church
pastor, a civil rights activist, said the fire was set.
Thirty Southern black churches have been victims of arson in the last 18
months. The most recent fire occurred Sunday in Greenville, Texas. No
connections have been made among the fires, but Clinton blamed racial hostility.
After the speech Saturday,
Arkansas historians and black leaders said they
did not remember any churches
burning in the state.
On Sunday a Clinton spokesman clarified the presidents' remarks after press
secretary Mike McCurry questioned him about the Arkansas fires.
"The president's recollection is that there were burnings of some black
community buildings in the '50s when he was a child, " White House spokesman Mary
Ellen Glynn said.
Page 4
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, June 11, 1996
But Monday evening the White House released the names of three black churches
that burned. A spokesman said Bethel AME Church in North Little Rock burned in
the mid-1960s, Mount Nebo AME Church in College Station burned the 1950s, and
the Collins Temple Baptist Church, now Canaan Baptist, in Little Rock burned in
the 1960s.
The Rev. Clarence Boyd of Bethel AME said his church burned Feb 3, 1970.
Larry White, a trustee of Mount Nebo AME, said the church burned in the 1960s.
Neither fire was arson.
The Collins Temple Baptist Church was destroyed by fire Dec. 16, 1965, two
months after being completely renovated. The cause of the blaze was not
determined.
The Rev. Leon Massey, the current pastor of Roanoke Baptist Church, remembers
standing over the embers of his church after it burned Sunday, Dec. 22, 1963.
"I remember going down the next day. It was just smoldering," said Massey,
who was 23 at the time. "Everything had collapsed into the basement. There was
just a wall or two standing.
All that was left was the church bell in the charred bell tower. The bell,
rung at funerals and to call
church together each Sunday, was too hot to touch
that day, Massey remembers.
Local authorities said the day after the fire that there was no evidence of
arson, according to news clippings.
But then-Roanoke Baptist Pastor James Donald Rice, the president of the local
NAACP, demanded an FBI investigation.
Clinton has pledged to have FBI and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms
agents visit churches around the South to help protect against arson.
But in 1963 no such help was coming. John Pope, then the special agent in
charge of the Little Rock FBI office, said an federal investigation was not
warranted, according to the news accounts of the day.
"The origin of the fire was never determined, and the persons responsible
were never apprehended, Massey said.
Residents of Hot Springs said Monday that the black community believed that
the fire was set in retaliation for Rice's efforts to organize the NAACP.
"He wasn't doing drastic things. He was just doing things like a lot of
people were doing around the country," said Alma Wesson, a Hot Springs resident.
"Things were real segregated here."
Massey said Rice's activism led several Hot Springs businesses, including
Walgreen's and Newberry's, to begin hiring blacks and to integrate their
establishments just before Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
"From that standpoint it was a resounding success," Massey said.
Page 5
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, June 11, 1996
But the congregation had a tougher time recovering.
The church bell was stolen
An insurance problem led to the church being paid
$ 3,200 for a structure valued in news reports at $ 500,000. Congregants had
to move to a Seventh-Day Adventist church while they tried to raise money for a
new church.
The new church, built on the ruins, was completed in 1968. The church bell
was recovered and mounted in the wall of the new church.
Today there are 200 church members, Massey said.
"It took a long time for the church to rebuild, " Massey said.
LOAD-DATE: June 11, 1996
DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY
BUREAU OF ALCOHOL, TOBACCO AND FIREARMS
Arson and Explosives Division
Church Threat
Assessment Guide
TOBACCO
MCOIOL BUREENT OF * by STATES * AND
1996
Clinton Presidential Records
Digital Records Marker
This is not a presidential record. This is used as an administrative
marker by the William J. Clinton Presidential Library Staff.
This marker identifies the place of a publication.
Publications have not been scanned in their entirety for the purpose
of digitization. To see the full publication please search online or
visit the Clinton Presidential Library's Research Room.
Page 4
LEVEL 1 - 23 OF 538 STORIES
Copyright 1996 The San Diego Union-Tribune
The San Diego Union-Tribune
June 23, 1996, Sunday
SECTION: NEWS; Ed. 1,2; Pg. A-3
LENGTH: 122 words
HEADLINE: Church-burning vigil set
SERIES: REGION UPDATE
From Union-Tribune news services
BODY:
Religious and civic leaders are planning a community vigil Saturday to fight
racism following two church fires in the Northwest that mirrored the burning of
more than 40 black churches in the South.
"We will protect each other," said Bill Wassmuth, executive director of the
Northwest Coalition Against Malicious Harassment. "We will stand by each
other. "
In Seattle, federal and local investigators are looking into a blaze that
caused $20,000 damage to the Eritrean Community Center last week. Arson is
suspected. In Portland, Ore., an investigation is under way in the arson case
of Immanuel Christian Fellowship, a predominantly black church that was burned
early Thursday. There have been no arrests.
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH
LOAD-DATE: June 23, 1996
William Raspberry
Another Look at Church Burnings
A question has been gnawing at the
concluded that the arson epidemic
no epidemic of black church burnings.
message of love and unity. I found it
go after the organizers and end the
edge of my mind. Suppose the arson-
may be less than meets the eye. For
Why couldn't I simply be relieved?
moving, and healing.
thing. Individual acts of arson are a
ous campaign against black churches
instance, the number of church burn-
The answer is that the reports of the
And of course there were the
hundred times harder to solve.
turns out to be no such thing. Will I be
ings (in states that compile such data)
burnings, as fearsome as they were,
speeches, the newspaper columns, the
Second, it is not necessary to be-
profoundly relieved? Or will I be just a
has remained fairly constant over the
served several purposes. To begin
editorials-all built on the assumption
lieve that the people at the CDR
little disappointed?
past several years-until after the
with, they riveted the nation's atten-
that the epidemic was real. Some com-
(originally the Anti-Klan Network)
I'm not proud of it, but the answer,
Center for Democratic Renewal
tion on a certain mean-spiritedness (no
mentators made the link between the
made up the stories of the church
I féar, is: Both.
doubt induced by economic unease) in
epidemic of burnings and the spirit of
burnings in order to mislead. What
The relief needs no explaining. The
America's politics. President Clinton's
anti-black permissiveness engendered
seems far more likely is that they
discovery that America, for all its
I hope I have the
trip to South Carolina to pray at a new
by the resurgence of ultraconservatism
"discovered" a new trend-probably
unresolved racial animus, still hasn't
church built to replace one that had
and the religious right.
without knowing that it was new-
returned to the time of the night-
grace not to be
been destroyed seemed to me just the
If there was no epidemic, the rheto-
and then became a clearinghouse for
riders and hooded terrorists would
right gesture. So did Ralph Reed's
ric falls of its own weight-even if
reports of burnings that otherwise
have to be a relief. Who could fail to
disappointed by
denunciation of the arsons, and his
racial hostility actually has increased.
might never have been compiled.
be relieved to learn that the country
promise to help raise money to rebuild
The fear is that the failure of the
I'm not ready to say that the whole
has not become so polarized that at-
the burned churches. If Clinton and
good news.
rhetorical link will make the message
epidemic never happened or that, to
tacks on houses of worship threaten
Reed believed (as most of us did) that
itself seem counterfeit.
the extent that there was an epidemic,
to become routine?
there was an "epidemic" of burnings,
Two things about the "epidemic."
it may have been triggered by the CDR
I'm not saying the wave of church-
(CDR) called a late-March press con-
they were right to call America to rise
First, I never thought it was a con-
and the news media. But I am at least
burnings has been proven a Tawana
ference to talk about the increase in
above such hatred.
spiracy in the sense of an orchestrated
ready to consider the possibility that
Brawley-type hoax, only that the
anti-black arson. Since then, the num-
Hundreds of men, women and
campaign. What seemed more likely
I've been duped-even if inadvertently.
scope of the problem may be consid-
bers are up significantly-though
youths packed off to the affected com-
was that a series of local idiots-not
What I hope for, if that should be
erably less than we had thought. Sev-
how many are race-based arsons is
munities in a church-raising frenzy
even necessarily racist idiots-decided
the case, is the grace not to be
eral investigators-notably Michael
hard to know.
that I thought was good for America's
to join what looked to be a trend.
disappointed by the good news. Isn't
Fumento writing in Monday's Wall
Suppose Fumento (and columnist
soul. If the arsonists' message was
Indeed, it was hard to know whether a
it enough to be relieved-and grate-
Street Journal-have looked both at
James K. Glassman before him [op-ed,
one of hate and division, these volun-
conspiracy might not have been prefer-
ful-to learn that there's less evil in
the numbers and the evidence and
June 18] is right-that there really is
teers wanted America to hear the
able. At least then the authorities could
the land than we feared?
Page 20
101ST STORY of Level 1 printed in FULL format.
Copyright 1995 Star Tribune
Star Tribune
December 25, 1995, Metro Edition
SECTION: News; Pg. 1A
LENGTH: 1012 words
HEADLINE: Lutherans find strength, solace in rebuilding after devastating fire
BYLINE: Martha Sawyer Allen; Staff Writer
BODY:
Replacing the costumes for Our Saviour's Lutheran Church's Christmas pageant
was fairly easy.
Prince of Peace Lutheran Church in Burnsville lent theirs to the south
Minneapolis congregation whose church was destroyed by fire Dec. 15.
Then, the problems became a little more difficult. A 4-year-old asked her
father, "Daddy, did God burn up in the fire, too?"
Now, the problems are much more complex. How can the 126-year-old
congregation keep its worshiping core alive and continue to provide the
essential services to the down and out, the homeless and those who need a
helping hand? How can it also be a worshiping witness to the city?
"In a way, it's been like a refiner's fire," said the Rev. Donald Rudrud,
who had just left the congregation as senior pastor to join the Evangelical
Lutheran Church in America's (ELCA) synodical offices to work on inner-city
church issues.
"Our Saviour's is alive and well and might even emerge stronger. Now maybe
because we won't be sustaining such a large building we'll put more energy into
helping the community, " he said.
Two bunches of flowers, daisies mostly, lie amid the soot, ice and broken
stones on the steps of the burned-out church, testimony to the congregation's
grief. The fire took a massive Norwegian Lutheran history with its stained-glass
windows, 83-year-old stone walls and altar art.
In Biblical terms a "refiner's fire" is an ancient process of separating
pure metal from its alloy. It came to mean a cleansing of a person through fire.
That's the best spin people seem to be able to put on the fire. The 300
members are using the fire to "cleanse" their congregation. "The odds are we'll
stay. The community wants us to," said congregational president Gail Lamb.
The Rev. Janet Tidemann said that many of the congregation's social-service
programs were earning enough money to sustain the physical building.
Page 21
Star Tribune, December 25, 1995
Everyone has stories of the offers of help that have poured in. Prince of
Peace gave' Tidemann a pager, "but I was having to stop all the time and ask
someone to use the phone because the beeper was going off," she said. "So my
husband got AT&T to give me a cellular phone. I hadn't even gotten it out of the
sack and it rang. I was answering a sack!"
Help came rolling in
Mt. Olive Lutheran Church, at 31st St. and Chicago Av., is going to house
the English Language program that was helping 160 students.
The homeless shelter will be able to stay in the neighborhood, in a
community services building at 19th St. and 11th Av which pleased church
leaders. They have a transitional housing program that helps people get up and
out of homelessness, and if the shelter were far from the housing, it wouldn't
have been nearly as effective, they said.
Lutheran Social Services provided chapel and office space at 2414 Park Av.
Christmas Eve services were to be held there and regular Sunday services are set
for 10:45 a.m. "In some ways our office space is better than before, Rudrud
said.
Money has come in from all over. St. Stephens Catholic Church, itself a
struggling inner-city congregation, gave a generous donation last Sunday, Rudrud
said. "That really pleased me."
The Jesus Video Project, an evangelical program that distributes a movie
about Jesus, sent a donation, but also called and offered help. "And I also said
we'd pray for them, said Director Chuck Fenrick.
Schmitt Music Centers loaned an organ. That pleased organist Rick Stanton,
who also lost a lot of his own sheet music. Lamb said Stanton was "so passionate
about that old organ. It took a lot to keep it up and he had done a concert in
the fall to raise money for repairs."
The congregation is trying to concentrate on what has been saved. The office
copier still works, and they saved some historic photos. Much of the educational
building is full of smoke damage but still standing.
Much is still needed
When a church burns, part of the community's soul goes with it. Tidemann
said that one elderly parishioner, who is terminally ill, worried about where
his funeral would be held. "We told him the [nearby] Messiah Lutheran Church
sanctuary is lovely and will be large enough for all the loved ones and friends
who'll want to come," she said.
She also has lost valuable time at Christmas. Usually she matches families
who can help with those who need help during the holidays. "Honestly, what we
need now is discretionary money. We need to be able to still help folks through
the holidays," she said. "Just today I gave some money to a homeless woman who
needed something to make her Christmas. We're not spending as much time with
that right now.
Page 22
Star Tribune, December 25, 1995
"We also need hymnals, If she said.
Lamb said the church was a safe place for people in the community. "We had
many children from the neighborhood who would come just by themselves. We
paired them with adults in the congregation to help them understand the service,
to do the things that parents do."
Future is in doubt
The ELCA assured the congregation that the synodical archives program had
saved all the church records, which are stored at Luther Seminary, and some
artwork. So they didn't lose their past.
What they're in danger of losing now is their future. Rudrud and Tidemann
passionately believe that Our Saviour's will come back stronger. Lamb is a
little more worried that now that so many of its services have temporarily moved
from the corner of 24th and Chicago, something may never fully come back when
they rebuild.
But, as Rudrud said, "They will be a vital group that carries on. The city
needs the church, any church, to be a center of people giving hope to each
other."
Our Saviour's
Lutheran Church
What: Sunday worship services.
When: 10:45 a.m.
Where: The Centrum, Lutheran Social Services, 2414 Park Av.
Information: To hear a message about services and how you can help, call the
church office at 871-2967.
GRAPHIC: Photograph
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH
LOAD-DATE: December 27, 1995